Starbucks has hired from within its own ranks to name its new managing director and vice president of Starbucks Coffee Trading Company, based in Lausanne Switzerland. After seven years with the company, Andres Berron will now oversee all green coffee operations, transportation, and coffee quality, working with the company’s global network of suppliers.
Berron has worked in sourcing coffees from Africa, the Asia-Pacific region and Colombia, overseeing procurement of green coffees from 17 origins. He has also worked in the company’s certifications operations, leading the brand’s in-house “C.A.F.E. Practices” program, which validates coffee farms around the world.
Most recently, he served as the company’s director of trading and traffic, with oversight of ethical sourcing, supplier relationships, risk management, and distribution of Starbucks’ global supplies of green coffee and cocoa.
“His expertise and leadership during the most tumultuous time in modern supply chain and coffee market history proved invaluable in managing risk and ensuring the continued and uninterrupted supply of the highest-quality, ethically sourced coffee to our global network,” Michelle Burns, executive vice president of global coffee, tea and cocoa wrote in a memo to Starbucks employees.
Berron’s hire kicked off the company’s search for a new director of trading and traffic.